viva la ben wrote:If Harrison returns and has say 15 sacks he'll be back next season.Troy is the one I'm more worried about....strained calf on the same leg that he had his achilles injury.

One thing for sure is safety and linbackers should be the priority next april.

our linebackers are fine. We need another aaron smith.

Don't find them growing on trees. I think this team is going to take a significant step back for a couple of years and hopefully have it's act together again before Ben gets too old. I think Ben is gonna put up some outstanding years in the stats department but it will be a hollow feeling as the team fails around him.

steelhammer wrote:The whole front 7 look terrible in the 2nd half. No pressure at all. They look out of gas. QB has all day to read the coverage and naturally someone is open.

Worldis is worthless. They need a legit pass rusher to play opposite woodley, if Harrison comes back and is ineffective, this is likely the sort of defensive performance we'll see from this team on the road.

The blueprint for beating the Steelers seems pretty clear: run the hurry-up offense so Hampton can't get off the field (or on the field?!?). McClendon only got in for 3 plays in yesterday's game while the D-line looked like they were playing at 10,000 ft above sea level.

that is not the recipe for beating th steelers. most/all nfl teams struggle with the hurry up/no huddle offense for the precise reason you mentioned. such is the reasoning that it is employed so frequently

Letang Is The Truth wrote:that is not the recipe for beating th steelers. most/all nfl teams struggle with the hurry up/no huddle offense for the precise reason you mentioned. such is the reasoning that it is employed so frequently

Okay, but I've never seen a Steelers' defense manhandled like this in the 2nd half of two of their first three games.

viva la ben wrote:If Harrison returns and has say 15 sacks he'll be back next season.Troy is the one I'm more worried about....strained calf on the same leg that he had his achilles injury.

One thing for sure is safety and linbackers should be the priority next april.

Troy worries me too. I think next year is his last season. Either way, they need to start looking at using an earlier round pick on a safety real soon.

Like others have said, I wouldnt be surprised if there is a major drop-off with this team soon. There are too many holes to fill, and not enough picks / cap space to do it.

The problem with replacing Troy is that, as far as I can tell, there isn't a college safety that plays like him. You can draft more safeties, but you'll have to restructure the defense because it doesn't look like God kept the mold used when he created Troy. Seriously, look at scouting reports and see how often guys are called "the next Ed Reed" instead of "the next Troy". That's not to diminish Reed- he's a great player and it's an open secret the Steelers were taking him if he fell to them in the draft. But Reed's game can be replicated.